


Raindancer

by White Aster (white_aster)



Series: Everything's Coming Up Kittens [1]
Category: Transformers (Bay Movies), Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Family, Future Fic, Kid Fic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2011-11-09
Updated: 2011-11-09
Packaged: 2017-10-25 21:07:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/274802
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/white_aster/pseuds/White%20Aster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>Mikaela shifted, putting a finger under Raindancer's chin to tilt her head up.  Raindancer's visor pulsed a sullen red.  "Hon, we love you, and a little mess isn't going to change that."</i>
</p><p>
  <i>"But he felt STORMY.  REALLY stormy."</i>
</p><p>
  <i>"I know.   I know you could feel him getting mad, but just because you get a little annoyed with someone doesn't mean you hate them.  Believe me, I'd have a lot fewer friends if that was true, for one.  And I doubt your carrier'd put up with me, for two."</i>
</p><p>(Part of the larger "Everything's Coming Up Kittens" series, which is in the far, far future in the Warrior Goddess timeline.  Said series is bits and pieces dealing with a lot of familiar characters' sparklings.  Set...seriously post-Earth.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Good Cop

Mikaela looked up from her screen, dragging her thoughts out of the conversation with Ironhide at the sound of the door opening and tiny stomping feet coming in. "Hang on a sec, 'Hide. Kiddo, it's bedtime, what are you--what is all OVER you?"

Raindancer, her tiny frame fairly VIBRATING with fury, spat angry static once, twice, stomped one foot, then...crumpled, struts slumping and vocalizer settling on a keening wail as she scrambled across the floor to leap into Mikaela's arms and latch herself firmly around her creator's waist.

"Uh. 'Hide.... Let me...call you back? Ooof, easy kiddo...."

Ironhide's expression was amused. "Sparkling emergency. Understood. It can wait until tomorrow."

"Right. I'll catch you then, 'round midcycle?."

"Fine by me. Go. Deal with your crisis."

"Thanks." She cut the transmission and wrapped her arms around her keening sparkling. "Hon, hon, kiddo, what's wrong? And what..." She pulled a hand away, rubbing between her fingers the sticky gray substance that was smeared across Raindancer's plating. She blinked as her med sensors returned a laundry list of ground minerals mixed with a fortified energon base. She fought to keep herself from laughing.

Sparkling supplement. Which was, very obviously, everywhere but IN the sparkling.

Mikaela opened her and Integrus' private comm line. ::Lose something?::

She got back a stream of glyphs so fast and spiky with irritation that she couldn't even catch most of it other than the bit at the end which sounded like several unflattering variants of "stubborn", followed by a concerned and demanding "WHERE?". ::Whoa, whoa, relax. She's fine, she's in my office with me. You...couldn't tell?:: She looked down at Raindancer, who was still keening softly. She should have lit up like a beacon of distress to Soundwave's telepathy.

The reply was shaded with relief, but still sharply annoyed. ::Sparkling: good defensive telepath when she doesn't want to be found..::

::Ah.:: _Man,_ Mikaela thought, _Must have been one hell of a fight. Kinda glad I missed it. Oh well, good cop to the rescue!_ ::Well, I've got her. Take a break. Primes need their rest, too. She'll keel over once she's done, and she can recharge here.::

::Negative. Don't want to encourage this behavior. Important to recharge at home.:: His glyphs were a mishmash of modifiers indicating "important to sparkling development" and the simpler "important to me".

::Yeah, good point. You're so much better at this discipline thing than I am.::

::Unsurprising,:: he deadpanned, with just enough amusement to indicate that he was teasing. Mikaela sent back a rude glyph with the same amused undertone.

Raindancer had quieted, her ventilations easier and her frame no longer overheating from stress. At some point she'd climbed up into Mikaela's lap, and she still clung like a barnacle, her face turned into Mikaela's torso. "Better?" Mikaela asked.

Raindancer nodded.

"Didn't want to drink your supplement, huh?"

Raindancer shook her head.

"I don't blame you. I remember Ratchet giving it to me whenever he could find the stuff to make it. Man, it was nasty, and it wasn't even flavored like yours is." She licked a bit of the sticky supplement off her finger and made a face. "Yeah. Not much better."

Raindancer didn't say anything, her face still turned away.

"You still know you've got to drink it, right?"

"Don't want to!" Raindancer said, her voice echoing off of Mikaela's side.

"It's good for you, hon. It makes you grow up big and strong."

"Don't care! It tastes nasty!"

"So you didn't want to and you got mad and threw things, hmm?"

A low mutter sounded from Mikaela's armpit.

"What was that?"

"Didn't THROW it," Raindancer said grumpily. "Just...didn't want it and I jumped and it went all over and Integrus felt all stormy and that made ME all stormy and I yelled and--" She clutched tighter at Mikaela, her field flashing with distress again as her voice climbed. "--and Integrus HATES me!"

 _Oh good lord._ Mikaela held the small blue frame as she keened softly, then pulled her gently back. "'Dancer, hon, listen to me, ok? Integrus does not hate you."

"Yes, he does!"

"NO, he doesn't. I promise."

"He was all mad, and I made a mess, and he's gonna hate me FOREVER!"

"Forever and ever, huh?"

"Yes!"

"Oh, man, that's funny, because when I talked to him he was really worried when he couldn't find you."

That derailed the drama train with a hiccup of tiny glitched vocalizer. "...really?"

"Really." Mikaela shifted, putting a finger under Raindancer's chin to tilt her head up. Raindancer's visor pulsed a sullen red. "Hon, we love you, and a little mess isn't going to change that."

"But he felt STORMY. REALLY stormy."

"I know. I know you could feel him getting mad, but just because you get a little annoyed with someone doesn't mean you hate them. Believe me, I'd have a lot fewer friends if that was true, for one. And I doubt your carrier'd put up with me, for two."

A trickle of amusement filtered through Raindancer's field, and she smiled, just a bit.

Mikaela smiled back. "There's my girl. Now, come on. I think we both need a trip to the washracks, and then you should go apologize to Integrus."

The apology would have to wait, Mikaela found, as Raindancer was already half asleep by the time she got to the dryer and fully asleep by the time Integrus arrived. ::Too late,:: Mikaela said from the couch, keeping to silent comms so as not to disturb the peacefully recharging sparkling next to her. ::Nothing like a little meltdown to tucker a sparkling out.::

Integrus vented a sigh and reached out. Mikaela handed the tiny bundle of sparkling over, and Raindancer shifted but didn't wake, burrowing into the warmth of her carrier's frame. ::She is well?:: he asked, peering at her as if to check and make sure she hadn't lost any limbs.

::Yeah, she's fine. There was a bit of drama about how you were going to Hate Her Forever, but we got that sorted out.:: Mikaela sat back down heavily on the couch.

::Sparklings.:: Integrus flickered a glyph of fond exasperation. ::Thank you. Turning around and finding her gone was...alarming.::

::I bet. It's fine. I keep feeling like I should be doing more, anyway.::

Integrus tilted his head. ::She is usually little trouble.::

That was never Mikaela's point when they had this conversation, but she knew pushing it wouldn't do any good. It was a human thing. Integrus never quite understood her feeling of responsibility for Raindancer. In Cybertronian culture, that was the carrier's place, not really the sparker's. She let the subject change. ::Except where her supplement comes in. I can't blame her. That stuff is disgusting. Honestly, we can do interstellar travel and rebuild a trashed world, but we can't make that stuff NOT taste like metal sludge?::

::It's supplement. It IS metal sludge.::

::My point still stands. Seriously, we should get Starscream on that.:: She leaned back against the cushions, feeling the tension in her back finally release. It had been a long day.

Integrus didn't look any better off, but he was used to sailing serenely past his limits. ::I'll mention it to him the next time I see him.::

::You do that.:: Mikaela grinned. ::Better yet, do it while I'm there, so I can see the look on his face.:: Her eye caught on the datapad on the side table, and her smile widened as she held it out to Integrus. ::Here. For you. She wasn't quite brave enough to want to do it face to face, but I told her to write it down.::

Watching Integrus' field change as he read was absolutely adorable. Scary Decepticon Prime, turned to puddle of creatorly goo by his sparkling's awkward but sparkfelt apology. ::I should have been more careful,:: he said, handing the datapad back. ::She's very adept at reading fields, and I let my irritation show.::

::It happens. You were both tired.::

::Primes do not get fatigued,:: Integrus replied, drawing himself up, word choices all exaggeratedly formal and condescending.

::Oh REALLY?:: she asked archly. ::Is that why you're about ready to fall over?:: It wasn't much of an exaggeration. She knew that he'd been up all the night before, preparing to address the Senate, and his glyphs were starting to revert to his original clipped grammar.

::Sparkling weight, unbalancing,.:: he said, visor turning down to look at Raindancer, who looked even tinier in his arms than she had in Mikaela's.

::Uh huh. I'm going to start building regular recharge into your schedule.::

::Unnecessary.::

::Like hell. Otherwise you'd have left by now, rather than standing there snarking at me..:: She checked her chronometer. Yeah, it was definitely time for bed. She hauled herself up. ::Come on.::

Integrus protested that it wasn't that far, that they should just go back to his quarters, but Mikaela couldn't help but notice that he followed her into the bedroom anyway. He set Raindancer down in the middle of the bed, then paused, watching her, until she vented a sigh and laid a hand on his shoulder. ::Lay DOWN. SLEEP. Honestly, you're more stubborn than SHE is.:: She flared her field, gently, pushing safety and security and her usual wordless tangle of affection at him. Pointedly, she pinged the apartment security to lock down to "the Prime's sleeping over"-level protocols.

She got a sluggish twitch of gratitude in reply, followed by the sound of transformation as he stowed his sensor panels for lying down. By the time she got to her side of the bed and laid down herself, Integrus' optics were off, his systems already powered down into recharge.

Mikaela shook her head, murmuring, "Big sparkling," at him with a really rather dangerous amount of fondness. _Better watch it, Mikaela,_ she told herself, with a wry smile, _or this little strictly-business thing you two've got going might get complicated._

She snorted as she arranged herself on the mattress, curling her body around the side of the bed, so that their sparkling would sleep curled between them. _Too late. WAY too late._


	2. Etched In My Skin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _She tapped the gridded globe on her shoulder, and Raindancer scrambled around to face it. "This one is a symbol for Earth, a planet far away. I spent a very important part of my life there. This means peace--" she used the more standard glyph that Raindancer would know "--and stands for the Long Treaty, when there was peace after the Great War. They were times that were important to me, so when I look at these, they remind me of those parts of my life."_
> 
>  _Raindancer traced the symbol, looking from the lines up to her creator's face. "So...they're stories. Happy stories that make you smile."_

"Pretty," Raindancer said. She perched on Mikaela's shoulder, one hand balanced on Mikaela's arm in an attempt to defy the laws of gravity as her small fingers traced the etching along Mikaela's shoulder and down her arm plating.

Mikaela smiled, one hand leaving her datapad to support her sparkling's curious reach. "You think so?" Raindancer trilled in absent thanks and leaned further into the support, hands reaching further down.

"Yes! Pretty!" Mikaela barely felt the pressure as Raindancer traced the gridded globe of Earth, the elongated star of exploration, the stylized winged lightning bolt of the Crackers. "Do they...do they mean things? This one means things," Raindancer said, pointing to the simplified sigil for "peace" that adorned Mikaela's upper left arm, right beneath the Earth globe.

Mikaela had to smile. As different as sparklings matured compared to human kids (being able to speak with them as soon as you could upload a language module into their processor was particularly fun), they still had to make all the usual connections between what they saw and what it actually meant. Raindancer recognized the sigil as glyph-like, knew what the original glyph meant, but wasn't quite at the point where she could recognize variations and recognize it for what it was.

"They're symbols, kiddo. Every time I did something or went somewhere that was important to me, that I wanted to remember, I made a symbol for it and etched it on."

Raindancer's reply was obviously confused. "Why?"

"So I would remember it."

"Why would you not remember important things?" Raindancer looked back at Mikaela over her shoulder, curious. "They're IMPORTANT."

Mikaela laughed. Raindancer was all of an Earth year old. She was still running off her primary memory buffer, probably hadn't even had to archive anything or understand why she might want to. "You can't think about ALL of the important things all the time, kiddo. More important things are always happening. You've got to think about other things, eventually." She rubbed a finger along Raindancer's back. She was probably getting too abstract. It didn't help that it was a complicated question.

"Look." She tapped the gridded globe on her shoulder, and Raindancer scrambled around to face it. "This one is a symbol for Earth, a planet far away. I spent a very important part of my life there. This means peace--" she used the more standard glyph that Raindancer would know "--and stands for the Long Treaty, when there was peace after the Great War. They were times that were important to me, so when I look at these, they remind me of those parts of my life."

Raindancer traced the symbol, looking from the lines up to her creator's face. "So...they're stories. Happy stories that make you smile."

She WAS smiling, Mikaela realized. "Yes. Yes, they are." She ran a finger down the Crackers symbol, a winged scythe surrounded by the six stars of fallen comrades. Her smile was bittersweet, and she wasn't sure that "happy" was the right word, but she didn't want to try to explain pain and remembrance to a tiny sparkling. 'Dancer'd learn that soon enough on her own. Looking down at the small, delicate frame, Mikaela's spark clenched. She could understand why no Cybertronian had wanted to have sparklings during the war, why it hadn't even been an issue, even as each side's numbers dwindled and they could have USED more soldiers. God, she couldn't even think of risking Raindancer getting hurt or killed.

 _Oh, hi, maternal instincts,_ she thought. _Nice to see you, finally._

"Tell me!" Raindancer said, scrambling down to sit on Mikaela's knee. She was heavier, now, than she'd been just a decacycle ago. "Tell me one of the stories!"

"Hey, now, what do you say when you ask for something?"

"Please! Please tell me one of your stories? Pleaaaase?" Oh god, that wide-opticked pleading look was the same no matter the species. Or maybe Raindancer'd just learned it from some of the Disney movies.

Mikaela checked her chronometer. Integrus had checked in, in his usefully neurotic way, a few breems ago. He would be there to pick up the kiddo in half a joor, tops. Totally time for a story. "All right, kiddo, but here's the deal: I tell you a story and you take your supplement for Integrus tonight with no complaining."

"Aaaaaaaw, but it tastes nasty! All gritty and bleagh!" The disgusted face she made was hilarious, but Mikaela didn't let herself smile.

"Don't care. That's the deal."

Raindancer frowned, her tiny EM field buzzing with concentration. "All right. As long as it's a GOOD story."

Mikaela laughed. "Kiddo, I ONLY tell the good stories."


End file.
